Cooper managed to open his eyes on the third attempt. But hell did it hurt. He rolled his tongue round his mouth, wanting to conjure up enough saliva to alleviate the sticky dryness. It didn’t work. His head pounded like he’d just banged it against a hard surface and his sinuses shot out hot pain, the kind which made it excruciating to even breathe.
His thoughts seemed hazy. Mind numb. Blank with tiredness. And even to try to contemplate reflecting on the experience he’d had, or how he felt, seemed impossible. Nothing seemed real. Not where he was. Not who he was. Like he was in a suspended state.
He pushed his back up against the tree trunk. Tried to slide up onto his feet. Got stuck half way. And though he aware of the scraping bark against his back, he wasn’t quite sure if it hurt or not.
Blew out heavily. Hoped to steady himself as well as to avoid being sick. Didn’t work.
‘Come on, come on.’
He spoke out loud. Or he thought he did. And with huge exhaustive effort, he wiped the vomit off his chin and began to stagger back along the path, stopping occasionally to bend over and vomit and rest his hands on his legs.
‘Where the hell have you been?’
Rosedale stood by one of the huts. Hands on hips. Towel draped over the back of his neck.
At first Cooper thought his words weren’t going to come. He cleared his throat. A groggy croak followed. ‘Not now Rosedale.’
‘Listen, Thomas, I need to talk to you. It’s important.’
‘I said, not now!’
He staggered against a tree. The sound of his own voice making him wince and knocking him sideward.
Maddie said, ‘Jesus, Tom, are you okay? You look really ill.’
He stared at Maddie. Memories from last night beginning to rush through his mind like a time-lapse video. ‘What…? Yeah… I’m fine.’
She reached to touch him, but he pulled away. Rubbed his head and was barely able to stand. ‘Look, I said I’m fine… Don’t fuss.’
Rosedale roared. ‘Of course he’s fine. He’s just a class-A mess. What did you do, hey, Thomas? Took too many of your candy pills? Or maybe this is the cold turkey talking? You run out of them, is that it? Talk to me, boy!’
Maddie’s concern touched both her face and her voice. ‘Shut up, Rosedale…! What is it, Tom? What’s happened?’
Cold sweat was running down Cooper’s face. He stared at her. Double vision. ‘Look, just leave me alone, okay… I’ll be back later… soon, whatever.’
Cooper staggered off to the sound of Maddie and Rosedale calling after him.
‘Tom…! Tom!’
‘Thomas, we need to talk!’
Cooper stumbled away into the forest. Headed for the river at the bottom of the hill. He needed to refresh. To cool. To think. He looked round, remembering it’d only been a couple of days ago since he’d been carrying Zola up the hill but now, hell, he was struggling even to walk. Leaning on every tree. Having to rest to close his eyes, only to begin to fall into a light sleep before jolting himself awake on losing his balance.
And with all energy sapped and drained and drawn out of him, it seemed to take forever to get to the river. And by the time he did, a film of cold clammy sweat sat unwelcome beneath his clothes.
Managing a half run. He closed his eyes. Fell onto his knees as if he was beset by a religious epiphany.
And the cool water felt just like it should… God it felt good.
He leant further forwards, letting the river rush over his head before entirely submerging it. He came back up only to plunge his head back down towards the muted jingle of pebbles on the riverbed.
With his head under the water Cooper watched the bubbles aerate and sit round his nose. He left his eyes open, feeling the cool. Letting it soothe. Watched the swirl of the clear water. And then watched it change.
A channel of red streamed gently past him, flowing innocuously by, as if part of a summer’s day.
He pulled quickly back up and felt the drag of the river weighing heavy. He looked around and wiped the water away and began to run and fought against the fatigue which was dragging him down.
He followed the trail of the blood upstream and on seeing something, he scrabbled down the bank and slipped and fell and tumbled into the water and waded across to the other side of the river, before he slowly realized what he was looking at.
‘Zola…! Zola…! Zola!’
He reached. Hauling her towards him. Turning her over like he’d done to Jackson all those years ago. ‘Zola!… Oh God, no!’
And he clasped her to him, lugging her out of the water and up onto the bank. Then sat her up. Cradling her in his arms as he rocked her gently.
‘Zola…’ he whispered. ‘Zola, it’s me, Thomas… Answer me, Zola… réponds-moi… please, say something. Dis quelque chose.’
There was no response. Nothing. Nothing at all.
‘Ne meure pas. Tu ne peux pas mourir… S’il te plait… ne meure pas.’
He felt a sudden wetness on his forearm. Then leaning Zola forward, he looked down in horror. The back of her skull had collapsed. Falling away. Leaving a gaping hole the size of his fist. Oozing fluid and oozing blood. Part of her brain falling out and onto his arm and dropping down to mix with the muddy, squelching ground.
He dropped her. His legs scrabbling underneath him faster than his body could move away. Staring at her lifeless body. Wondering if what he was seeing was real or not. Maybe this was part of the trip. The come down.
He touched her body gently with his boot to see if she was real… Yes. Oh my God. He looked her again. He thought she’d just fallen.
Slipped.
Hit her head.
Assumed she had. But there was no mistaking what’d happened.
Zola had been shot.
And Cooper, covered in blood, scooped her up, not hearing the sound of his own drawn out cry. And he struggled and tried to see through his tears as he walked along the road, carrying her body towards the village.
‘Oh my God, Tom, what’s happened? What have you done?’
It was Maddie coming up from behind him. But he didn’t stop. Forced her to run in front of him with Rosedale blocking his way.
Rosedale stared. ‘What the hell happened, Thomas? Tell me you haven’t done this.’
‘She’s been shot.’
Rosedale paled. ‘What?’
Cooper could hear his voice was strained. Pained. ‘I think we were probably followed back here… That red motorcycle Maddie saw…’ He trailed off. Couldn’t focus, and he thought Rosedale was asking him questions, but his voice seemed too distant, too far away to hear.
‘Thomas, do you think whoever did it was just after her, or us? Perhaps they saw her show us the land, and couldn’t risk her talking. Or maybe it was a warning. But whatever way, I reckon this is Bemba’s doing, I just know it. When did it happen…? Thomas! Thomas, I’m talking to you.’
‘What…? What…? I don’t know… I just found her.’
‘What the hell do you mean, you don’t know? I thought she was with you? You were supposed to be looking after her.’
His own thoughts confused him. ‘She was, last night, then she left me and…’
‘Left you, where? What the hell were you doing? Why weren’t you keeping an eye on her?’
He tried to concentrate on Rosedale. He could see thoughts were playing out on his face. Angrily he spat out more words. ‘Thomas, I reckon this has got something to do with the way you were behaving earlier… Well has it…? Answer me, boy!’
‘Get out of my way.’
Rosedale shook his head. ‘No, not until you tell me what’s going on. That, and the fact we also need to move from here. We can’t afford to be seen, and carrying a dead body about, in my books, would make us look pretty suspicious.’
The anger rushed through Cooper. ‘Everything’s one big joke to you, Rosedale, isn’t it?’
Rosedale leant in to Cooper as the rain began to pour down. ‘You need to get a goddamn hold of yourself, Thomas. You’re going to jeopardize everything here, probably even us, if you don’t get off the road.’
‘You can do what you like, Rosedale, but see right now, there are way more important things than Granger’s freaking plane. Like this dead woman.’
Maddie tried to calm the situation. She glanced around, nervous for Cooper.
‘Tom, please, Rosedale’s right, we need to move. Whoever’s done this to her, they might be still around. Come on… Now!’
Cooper turned on Maddie. ‘What would you like me to do, Maddison? Leave her here? Just dump her on the road? That’s what you want isn’t it?’
Maddie reddened. ‘No, God no, but you need to listen to me. We have to get out of here. Tom, look at me. Tom…’
‘Leave it, Maddison, Thomas here doesn’t want to listen, he’s got that crazy look in his eyes. Unravelling right in front of us. But let me tell you something, boy. If you think you’re going to do what you always do, go over the line, lose sight of the aim of the investigation, and the reason why we’re here, then you’ve got another think coming. You are not going to put us in danger.’
Cooper felt a darkness descend on him. ‘Like I said, get the hell out of my way.’
‘No can do, Thomas. We, and that includes you, need to get off this road and fast.’
‘I’m warning you.’
Rosedale tilted his head. His voice menacing. ‘Is that a threat, Thomas? Are you threatening me?’
Maddie, pulled at Rosedale’s arm. ‘No, no, of course he’s not saying that. Tell him, Tom, you’re not threatening him, are you?’
‘Yeah, Thomas, tell me…’
Rosedale waited for an answer from Cooper. And he got one.
Still holding Zola, he freed one of his hands to slip it to his back holster to draw out his gun. He saw only a flicker of emotion crossing Rosedale’s face, unlike Maddie’s who looked at him in alarm.
And even though Cooper held Zola in the crook of one arm, the gun, pointing at Rosedale, was precision steady. ‘I’ll ask you again, Rosedale… Move the hell out of my way.’
Rosedale pulled at the buttons on his shirt, exposing his chest. ‘Be my guest, Thomas, but a word of advice… make sure you kill me.’
Cooper flicked off the safety catch with his thumb, drawing back the trigger on his Colt series 7. ‘Your choice.’
‘No! No! No!’
Maddie shouted as she jumped in front of Rosedale, who looked more shocked than he’d done when Cooper had pulled the gun on him. She cried as torrents of rainwater ran down her face. ‘Put the gun down, Tom! Please, just put it down. We can work out whatever’s going on. You don’t need to do this…’
‘Move out of the way, Maddie. This is between me and Rosedale.’
‘No, I won’t. I’m not moving. I’m going to stay right here. So if you want to shoot Rosedale, you’ll have to shoot me, too. So come on, what’s it going to be?’
Cooper gritted his teeth, this time able to feel the pulse throbbing above his eye. But he couldn’t quite work out what he was feeling as he talked to her.
‘You want to see if I’ll shoot both of you? Is that what you want? Is that what you want to see? Why are you doing this, Maddie?’
Maddie didn’t even bother trying to wipe away her tears. ‘Me…? Why am I doing this? Look at yourself, Tom. You’ve lost it. You need to get help. I can’t look after you anymore. I’ve tried, I really have but I can’t do this. That’s why I left, because I couldn’t do it anymore and I didn’t want Cora to see her daddy like this.’
‘Leave her out of it.’
‘No, you’ve got to listen. We’re all here trying to help you.’
‘I never asked you to come, Maddie, in fact I never wanted you to.’
‘But I did, Tom, because I knew this was going to happen, like it used to when you were looking for her.’
The gun in Cooper’s hand began to shake. ‘I don’t need you to look after me, but there you are. Hanging on, hanging around. When will it sink in, Maddie, I don’t want you anywhere near me. Never have. Desperate isn’t a good look.’
Rosedale intervened. ‘Shut up, Thomas.’
‘Shut up? Correct me if I’m wrong, Rosedale, but isn’t it you who keeps on wanting me to speak to Maddie and tell her how it is? How I really feel about her. Well, that’s exactly what I’m doing.’
There was the sound of another hammer cocking. This time it was Rosedale. He pointed his gun straight at Cooper. ‘I said shut up, Thomas.’
As the Congolese rain thundered down, Cooper stood in the middle of the wide, red-mud road, pointing his weapon at Rosedale, as he pointed one at him, with Maddie standing between them. But he wasn’t backing down. Not one bit.
‘Maddie, I don’t love you. I never will, not even…’
Rosedale broke into his words. ‘Shut up! Not unless you want me to blow you away, right now. Which is it going to be? Shut up or I’ll do it for you, and you know I will, hell Thomas, you know it’s true. Back when we worked together. Did I ever hesitate? Did I ever back down from killing a man? No, and I haven’t changed.’
Cooper’s lips moved to speak but it was Rosedale who got in first. ‘Think about it real carefully before you say anything else, ‘cos if you die, what’s going to happen if she comes back?’
Cooper blinked. ‘What?’
‘What if Ellie is really alive and she comes looking for you? But it’ll be no good if you’re dead. What then? Haven’t you already lost enough because of her? Your friends. Your family. Your kid. The chance of happiness, the chance of anything. Hell, if anyone’s the living dead around here, it’s you. Nothing else mattered apart from that search of yours, did it? How many years did you look? Travelling around and getting into trouble in the hope you’d find her. And every time, Maddie would come and find you. You should be ashamed, Thomas. But then everyone thought you’d come to your senses. Put it behind you. You got married, had a kid. And from the outside it looked so good. You and Maddie together. But up here. In your head. You never stopped searching, did you? Never really let her go. But you know what I think? I think it was never about Ellie. It was about you. The search was never about finding her, it was about finding yourself. You’re lost Thomas, always have been, always will be. And the drugs have just finished you off. You’ve got nothing else, and this ghost of Ellie which haunts you is the only reason you’ve got to keep on living. Without it you’re dead, but what you don’t see Thomas, is with it, you’re dead as well.’
And the only sound was the drone of the rain as Cooper lowered his gun. He walked round Maddie and Rosedale without saying anything else. In the distance he heard Rosedale talk with loving warmth. ‘Maddison, listen to me, you know what…’
‘Don’t bother, Rosedale. I know what you’re going to say, but both of us know full well he meant it. He meant every single word.’